


Harry Styles and the Seven-Year Chase

by siempreniall



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Friends to Lovers, Harry Potter AU, Hogwarts, M/M, Slow Burn, as much slow burn that can fit in 11k tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-11
Updated: 2014-09-11
Packaged: 2018-02-17 00:59:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 11,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2291153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/siempreniall/pseuds/siempreniall
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry and Niall bump into each other, literally, on top of the Astronomy Tower, and then skirt around feelings for seven years.</p><p>- A Harry Potter AU -</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Harry Styles and the Midnight Meeting

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by Niall's foray into being a Harry Potter nerd. This is a fic in seven parts, one for each year Harry & Niall (and Liam, Zayn, and Louis to a lesser extent) attend Hogwarts. Thanks to all that read it early and stroked my ego - you know how important that is for me.

The first time Harry meets Niall is on top of the Astronomy Tower at midnight. The early September air is brisk and the moon is bright; the expansive grounds of Hogwarts spread out underneath them. In most circumstances it would be a rather romantic place for two people to run into each other. Those circumstances don’t usually involve anxious first-years carrying armfuls of star-gazing supplies that clatter when they hit the ground, alerting everyone else on the rooftop to the collision that’s just taken place.

“I’m sorry,” Harry blurts out quickly as he tries to gather up the star charts and telescope that are scattered over the floor. The other boy, the one who he’s run into like an _idiot_ , doesn’t get angry, though, not like the girl who screamed like a howler when Harry accidentally stepped on her robes at breakfast. This boy… this boy’s kind.

“What’re you apologizing for?” he asks as he bends down to help Harry pick up everything, “Neither of us were looking where we were going, it’s a draw at least,”

“Fair enough,” Harry smiles. They finally manage to figure out which supplies belong to which boy, and with everyone else already set up they take the last two spots together at the other side of the tower.

“I’m Harry,” he finally says after they get situated. He extends his hand for the boy to shake and he does, vigorously and for too long.

“Niall,” he replies before Madam Skummel is shushing them both.

The hour passes slowly, half because Harry couldn’t care less about stars and half because it should be illegal to hold classes at midnight. By the time they’re told they’re ready to go Harry’s yawned fifteen times, counting every last one of them.

“Wasn’t that great?” Niall asks next to him. Harry’s half-forgotten he was even there considering no one was allowed to talk the entire time.

“What do you mean?” Harry replies, his voice all low and drawly from sleep deprivation.

“Getting to see all those stars! I’ve never seen such a clear sky as this, even if Mullingar’s in the middle of feckin’ nowhere,”

“Mullingar?”

“S’ where I’m from. Middle of Ireland in County Westmeath,” and that would explain the accent Harry hasn’t been able to peg, “Surrounded by green and not much more, if I’m being honest. Even then, though, you can’t see a sky like this out there,”

“You didn’t find it boring? Just looking up at the sky?”

“Boring?” Niall squeaks, Harry can read the disgust in his face from his tone alone, “We’re standing alone on this dot of earth, looking out into the rest of the universe, and you call it _boring_?”

“Well, I mean, you put it like that, and, it’s not just star charts, you know, and-”

“Shut up,” Niall says as he hits Harry in the arm with his elbow, “I was just giving you grief. Don’t like the stars? That’s more for me,”

And then they’re finally back inside, away from the darkness and chill, and into light, where Harry can _finally_ see what Niall actually looks like.

The first thing he notices, before the bleached-blonde hair or the smattering of freckles, before the crooked teeth and bright blue eyes, before the infectious smile and the crinkles on his forehead, is the yellow and black tie looped around his neck.

“Oh, you’re in Hufflepuff?” Harry asks quickly as they descend the stairs back into the heart of the castle. He doesn’t think these ones move like those in the center, and for that he’s eternally grateful. They’re enough to give him a heart attack nearly six times a day.

“Yeah!” Niall beams back at him, “Is that a problem?”

“Oh, no! I guess I’d just forgotten that Astronomy was shared between houses. That _would_ explain why I didn’t remember meeting you a few nights ago, or any time in between,”

“Gryffindor, then?” Niall says as he looks down at Harry’s own neck.

“Yeah, I was pretty proud of that one. My family has a long line of Gryffindors and I’d hate to be the first one to muck that up,”

“I didn’t care, to be honest. All the houses sound good to me, wasn’t really bothered. And it’s not like I had anyone to disappoint. Both my parents are muggles so they’re just pretty impressed that I’m all magical,”

Harry’s forgotten that those exist – muggle-borns. Especially those like Niall, who seem so at-ease in an environment they haven’t grown up in. Like the magic really courses through his blood.

“Oh, well, I’ve heard that’s a good house too. Close to the kitchens and all,”

Niall laughs, “You’ve got no idea!”

They finally reach the bottom of the stairs and as Harry moves to follow his classmates to the right, Niall breaks off to the left.

“Is that where your dormitories are?” he asks, because he barely knows where he’s supposed to go in this castle, much less anyone else.

“Yeah, so I guess I’ll see you around?”

They’re stopped in the middle of the corridor and people keep on running into them in their drowsy haste to get to bed. Harry doesn’t care, though; this goodbye seems important for some reason.

“At least once a week during lessons, I guess,”

“Well, that’s better than nothing,” he smiles in earnest, which does something to Harry’s stomach. It’s nice to have a friend based around more than just sharing a bedroom.

“See you next week, Niall,”

Niall sends him off with a salute, balancing his materials easily in his right arm, “Try not to bump into anyone else without me around to clean it all up!” Then he’s turned around and out of Harry’s sight.


	2. Harry Styles and the Muggle Phone Call

“Have you heard from Niall today?” Harry’s mother asks as she stands in the kitchen making their breakfast. It’s been a good Christmas morning; he’s gotten the Cometsweep XIV, just like he asked for, and the smell of cinnamon pancakes wafts through the house. His dad’s even been able to make it to town for the day, which only happens every few years or so. The ground outside is covered in white but his home feels warm as ever. Yeah, it’s pretty good.

“No, I don’t think owls reach him that easily,” he shrugs, “Or else he’s really bad at getting back to me. Either way, it’s possible that he’s just spending time with his family for the holidays. I’ll speak to him when I get back to school, it’s no big deal, though,”

“That is a shame, isn’t it? You’ve got yourself a nice friend but he lives all the way in Ireland, too far to invite over that often, even too far for an owl to reach in a good amount of time. Wouldn’t it be nice if there was some easier way to reach him?”

“I don’t know,” Harry responds, reading through the instruction manual on his new broom, “Niall’s parents don’t allow floo powder in their house after the incident from last summer. There really aren’t any other ways are there?”

He turns away from his booklet to find his mother standing in front of the stove with a too-large grin across her face.

“What if I told you that there’s one more present under the tree?”

“What? That’s ridiculous! I opened them all earlier-” and then Harry quiets down as he looks back under the tree to find one present still there, wrapped in neat red paper with a glittery green bow, “Oh,”

“Yes, ‘oh’ is right. Get in there, boy, before I change my mind!” she rushes him ahead with her spatula and stands in the kitchen doorway as he finally gets to open the box. Inside is a lot of air and that wrapping material that muggles love that looks like little spots of plastic clouds, and inside that is a… is a…

“What is it?” he asks, holding up the hunk of plastic.

“Oh, dear lord! What are they teaching you in that school? Aren’t you taking muggle studies?”

“I’m not old enough yet! Gems is, though,”

“Whatever, Harry,” she sighs, and honestly shouldn’t he be the one who’s mad that his own mother can’t distinguish between her two children, “It’s a cellphone, okay?”

“Okay,” he mumbles, brushing his fingers over the cold, smooth surface. His face shines back to him through the black screen, “What’re those again,”

“Honestly!” his mother huffs, “It’s a way to communicate! People – muggles – have telephone numbers, and when you put them into your own telephone you can call them, kinda like sticking your head through floo powder, but you can only hear their voice,”

“Oh,” he says, and then _finally_ the words click in his head and his eyes bug out in excitement, “You can call muggles!”

His mom nods.

“And Niall’s family are muggles!”

She nods again.

“Niall’s muggle family has a telephone!”

She laughs, “Yes, Harry, God. Took you long enough,”

“Oh, but,” he frowns, “I haven’t got his numbers,”

“Did you look at the card?”

He rushes back into the box to find the card, just a simple piece of parchment with a few numbers written out. A few minutes ago they’d have been absolutely useless, but now they’re everything he needs.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” he shouts, grabbing his mom around the waist and pulling her into the biggest hug of the day. She pets over his hair soothingly and kisses the side of his head.

“Now, it’s not perfect. Muggle electronics don’t like to work properly with all of this magic around,” she motions with her hands to the room around them; everything, from the self-cleaning fish tank to the moving pictures on the wall, is laced with magic, “But, your father and I did a little digging, and we’ve found that it works alright in the back garden underneath the tree,”

“Can I-”

“Oh, hurry along!” his mother says excitedly, “But don’t take forever! You’ve got all break to call Niall, but these pancakes are only going to last ten more minutes before I eat all of them!”

He hugs her again, and a third time just because he can, before he’s slipping into his big coat and heavy boots to run into the garden. It’s confusing at first to figure out how this is supposed to work. There are a lot of buttons and none of them make any sense, but with a little help from instructions written in his mother’s handwriting he’s able to push everything he needs to hear a strange set of tones, a few rings, and finally an Irish accent.

“Hello?” the other person says. The voice is unfamiliar to Harry, but he just assumes it’s Niall’s mother. Or at least he hopes; he has no hope of figuring out how to reach Niall if this isn’t it.

“Hi, is Niall there?”

“May I ask who’s calling?”

“It’s Harry; Niall’s mate from school?”

“Oh, dear!” she says, the delight evident in her tone, “I knew you’d be calling, but I didn’t expect so soon. Hold on one moment, love, Niall’s up in his room completely enamored with his new X-Box,”

Harry doesn’t know what that is but he sits patiently as Niall’s mother yells out his name, until finally he hears loud footsteps banging down some stairs, and the sweet and light lilt of before melts into a deeper brogue.

“Who’s this?” Niall asks plainly.

“Harry, you doofus!”

“Harry who?”

“Harry! Harry Harry! How many Harrys do you know, bloody hell!”

“Oh my God,” Niall says finally, the realization creeping up and then slamming onto him, “You’re Harry!”

“Yes, that’s it! I’m Harry, glad we’ve finally got that figured out!”

“But you’re calling me! Via a muggle thing!”

“Yes,”

“And you’re not a muggle!”

“I’d really hope not; it’d be mighty awkward to return to Hogwarts without my magic,”

“Holy shit!” Niall yells, followed by a screeching reprimand from his mother. Harry can hear him race back up the steps he just came down, a door closing Niall into what Harry can only assume is his room.

“How is this happening? Phones shouldn’t work around all that magic at your house!”

“It only works in the back garden, so we’ve got to be quick before my fingers freeze off. I forgot to bring some gloves out,”

“But, I don’t get it, how is this happening?”

“It’s my last Christmas present, I guess. My parents thought it was a shame that I never get to see you over holidays, and they got me something to change that,”

“Wicked,” Niall whispers over the line, “Mate, I love magic to death, but you agree that this is like one billion times better than owls, yeah?”

Harry would have to disagree, because there’s nothing better than getting a heartfelt letter delivered to you by a spotty owl with a sweet temperament, but these phones have got a few things going for them.

“It is nice to hear your voice, yeah. And, like, hear from you more than twice a holiday. Speaking of holiday, how’s it going?”

“Great!” Harry can hear Niall’s smile through the phone, “I’ve got some spending money to use in Diagon Alley before we leave since my parents haven’t got a clue of what to buy me in terms of magic stuffs, but they got me some other good things as well. Nice jumpers, chocolate eggs, the whole shebang,”

“Wait,” Harry remembers, “Did you get a Hex-Box or something? Also, what’s a Hex-Box?”

“ _X_ -Box, Harry, honestly, but if phones are freaking you out this much I think it’s still a bit too soon to learn about video games. I’ll teach you when we get back, though, deal?”

“Obviously. Will you sneak treacle tarts out of the kitchen and tell me about them in that hidden nook on the third floor?”

“Harry,” Niall sighs, “Is the headmistress magic?”


	3. Harry Styles and the Unsatisfactory Butterbeer

“Are Zayn and Louis coming?” Niall asks from underneath the warmth of his scarf. It comes out all mumbled, but Harry can understand him all the same.

“No, they got in trouble last week for a prank on Melissa Warbeck in potions,”

“Typical Slytherins,” he whispers, “And what about Liam? He should be here,”

“No, I saw him in bed this morning. All cooped up with a cold. Actually, I wouldn’t be surprised if Louis and Zayn hexed him so they wouldn’t be alone today,”

“Dylan? Neil? Arjun? Edie? Eli? Any of them coming?”

Harry just pulls his lip between his teeth and shakes his head. It’ll just be the two of them for the day.

“Bloody hell! Well, let’s get going, then,”

Both of them descend the steps into the courtyard where everyone else is gathered. Professor Hartnell stands imposing in front of them all reading off a list of rules for their entry into Hogsmeade. Niall chooses not to listen, though, considering he could probably recite them in his sleep. The entire faculty has been drilling each rule into their head ever since they announced the first Hogsmeade trip a few weeks back.

“So how much money you got?” he turns to Harry to ask.

“Uh,” Harry pulls out the baggie he’s got stored away in his pocket, “Ten galleons and a smattering of sickles and knuts I found all strewn about my trunk. Don’t know where they’re from, but they’ll be able to buy an ice cream or something. You?”

“Fourty pounds,” Harry just stares blankly back, “Which is eight galleons. Not a lot, but enough. Don’t need to buy too much,”

“Are we all ready to go?” the professor finally yells after checking off every last rule. The crowd rustles as that; they’ve been ready to go for _hours_ , maybe even days. In small groups they’re led down the snowy path towards the small village. It seems to always be snowing every time the school plans a trip, and Harry idly wonders if it’s some kind of magic that the school puts on – making the town even more enchanting for the students who only get to come a few times a school year.

“I’m so fucking excited,” Niall yells, though it’s muffled by his scarf, as they pass through the gates. It’s the first time they’ve left Hogwarts grounds since they arrived there in September and Harry’s been itching to leave, the excitement thrumming through his veins.

They’ve been cooped up for so long, colder than normal weather pushing them back into the castle, and for weeks they’ve been tempted with the promise of Hogsmeade – both a reward for good behavior and the first time they’re actually being _trusted_ to not tarnish the good Hogwarts name. Harry suddenly feels older, more like an adult, though that’s honestly a bit over exaggerated.

“Where to first?” Niall asks from next to him. He’s been relying on Harry to tell him everything he’s ever heard about Hogsmeade from Gemma. They’ve spent a few nights huddled in front of the fireplace in the great hall talking about it, planning which shops they want to stop by and which foods they’ll want to buy.

“I dunno,” Harry shrugs, “I want to visit Tomes and Scrolls to get my mum a Christmas present, but other than that I’m up for anything,”

They stop by the bookstore to find a new edition of Harry’s mum’s favorite spell book, then wander the streets of the town without a plan. It’s quite busy with everyone from Hogwarts (and quite a few professors, as well) hurrying from shop to shop to get their fill of the town before they have to leave. The two of them stop off at a few places (Zonko’s, to buy Louis and Zayn some dungbombs; Spintwitches, to buy Liam some varnish for his broomstick; Honeyduke’s, to buy an impressive amount of chocolate frogs and liquorice wands and sugar quills for Niall’s own supply) before finally arriving at The Three Broomsticks.

It’s busy (of course, considering the pub is its own rite of passage - up there with Hogsmeade itself) but they manage to find a table tucked away in a corner where the two of them can sit alone to sip down their butterbeers and their fish and chips.

“I feel like we need to say something to commemorate this,” Harry says as they both stare down at their meals.

“Like saying grace?”

Harry whips his head up to look at Niall, “What’s grace?”

“Never mind. I guess we should just dig in?” Niall offers before holding out his fist. Harry bumps it with his own before they pick up their mugs in tandem to get their first taste of butterbeer, gulping it down greedily.

“Oh my God!” Harry nearly groans, a moustache of foam stuck to his upper lip, “It’s even better than I imagined!”

Gemma’s been telling him ever since her own third year about how good the drink is, how it warms you to the bone and back with the most satisfyingly sweet taste that lingers in your mouth for hours after you’re done drinking. It’s better than that, though, slightly fizzy but not too overwhelming in any way. He’s about to ask Niall how in love he is with it when he sees his face – or rather, the grimace on it.

“What? What’s the matter? Is it stale? Can butterbeer go stale?”

“No,” Niall says as he puts the mug down and wipes the foam off his mouth with the back of his sleeve, “It’s just… it’s called butterbeer,”

“And?” Harry knows he can’t possibly be upset about the name.

“Well, I was just expecting alcohol, is all!”

It takes a few seconds for Harry to comprehend why that would actually be a bad thing.

“You’re fourteen! Why in the world would Hogwarts send you out a few times a year to drink alcohol!”

“Dunno,” Niall says plainly as he sticks a chip in his mouth, “Was kinda excited for it, to be honest. Thought maybe the wizarding world had different laws about drinking and stuff. That isn’t why everyone is excited to come down here?”

“No!” Harry yells, making a few people nearby turn their heads to look at him, “Niall it’s just a delicious drink. That’s why everyone gets so excited,”

“I guess. You ever have a Dr. Pepper? That’s some quality shit,”

“What in the _world_ is a Dr. Pepper and why are you drinking a medical professional?”

“It’s like a fizzy drink that’s refreshing as on a hot summer day, and it’s got 23 flavors, Harry! If that’s not magical, then what is?”

“You seriously don’t like butterbeer?”

“It’s not bad,” he shrugs, “But, I mean, Harry… _Dr. Pepper_ ,”

“I’m, like, not even hungry anymore,” Harry stares down at his half-finished plate. He drinks the rest of his butterbeer quickly, licking at his lip to get the last few drops. Niall, though, is quite the opposite; his plate’s completely empty but his mug’s still mostly full.

“I’ll go get you a bag, then,” Niall says, getting up from the table, “I’ll finish your part on the walk,”

“Never in my life,” Harry rolls his eyes. He grabs Niall’s mug to finish it, hardly paying mind to whether or not Niall’d want to do the honors.

“Are we heading back to the castle?” he asks as Niall returns to stuff the rest of his greasy food in a gray paper bag.

“No! Harry, are you kidding? We’ll miss the best part if we go back now!”

“What?” Harry pops a stick of gum in his mouth, it’s orange mint and he bought it in line when it took Niall five minutes to check out at Honeyduke’s, “Is there like a show or something? A sing and dance number? Carolers?”

“Honestly, you’re so dense,” Niall says as he pushes through the door, back into the cold with all his bags in hand. Harry grabs the ends of Niall’s scarf that hang down his back to loop around his neck, keep him warm and away from sickness, “I’m talking about the Shrieking Shack, of course,”

That stops Harry dead in his tracks.

“No!” he nearly yells, his arms coming up to cross his chest, “I’m not going anywhere near there!”

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me! It’s not even haunted! It doesn’t even fucking shriek anymore!”

“Niall, I am not going within a hundred meters of any building that shrieked enough at _any_ point in time to receive that name,”

“ _Harry_ ,” Niall whines, his pout evident through his half-covered face, “I’ve already had to suffer through a non-alcoholic drink that has beer in the name and waiting inside a bookshop for thirty minutes as you looked for the _perfect_ present for your mum,”

“-Need I remind you how long you took in Honeyduke’s?”

“No. Just do this one thing for me, Harry, this _one thing_ and then we can go back to the castle and snuggle in front of the fireplace or something,”

Harry thinks it over for a second, because he really does not want to go, but Niall is very hard to say ‘no’ to all the same.

“Will you give me a sugar quill?” he asks lowly.

Niall’s face breaks out into a wide grin, “I’ll give you a sugar quill _and_ I’ll sneak you some eggnog from the kitchen for breakfast tomorrow,”

Harry’s barely said “okay” before Niall grabs his hand and drags him in the direction of ‘the most haunted building in Britain’, his hand an embarrassingly comforting weight in Harry’s. 


	4. Harry Styles and the Great House Dilemma

“Oh, Christ, there you are,” Niall says as he plops down beside Harry on the floor. They’ve moved a few cushions into their little hidden nook up on the third floor. It’s been their favorite hideout ever since they’d found it on accident their second year, hidden away behind a curtain and guarded by a mock army of suits in armor.

“Have you been looking for me long?” Harry asks, though he refuses to look at Niall and instead sits with his knees to his chest and stares out at the Black Lake below them.

“No, ‘cos I knew exactly where you’d be. And I wasn’t wrong, was I?”

Harry shakes his head and finally turns his head to say hello. He finds that Niall’s also tracked in some food from dinner: some roast potatoes stuck in foil, a turkey leg, and way too many chocolate éclairs for Harry to eat on his own. Some of them are for Niall, he’s sure.

“I’m not hungry,” he mumbles.

“Never said this was for you, did I?” Niall smiles. Harry just hits him across the arm and grabs the turkey leg, pulling a few pieces off to eat for himself.

Finally, Niall reaches behind him and pulls out some bottles of pumpkin juice, the ones that he receives in bulk from the kitchen elves who favor him (so, all of them) and hoards under his bed.

“How did you manage to carry all that?”

“I’m magic, don’t you remember?”

“I don’t know what class you learned that from in charms, but I must’ve missed the day we learned to apparate food from our clothes,”

“Nah, I’m talking about muggle magic. After ten years of sneaking in snacks to over-priced movie theatres, you’re better than any damn wizard at pulling food out of your clothes,”

Harry takes another bite of his turkey and it feels good in his stomach. He’d barely eaten lunch and that was hours ago. Every time he skips dinner it sounds like a good idea, and every single time he’s wrong in the end.

“So, what’s wrong with you today?” Niall starts, digging into his éclair already.

“You say that as if I have a problem every single day,” Harry huffs.

“Maybe not, but enough so that it’s become a Thing. Now spill,”

“Fine. I was talking to Liam today in transfiguration and-”

“Fuckin’ hell, what did Liam do?” Niall interrupts.

“Nothing! It wasn’t Liam, it was Stan Markel,”

“Oh? Fuck Stan Markel, you know that kid’s an arse,”

“Yes, I know that. It’s just… he always makes me feel like I don’t belong in Gryffindor,”

Niall stops chewing and swallows down what’s left in his mouth. All of his attention’s devoted to Harry now.

“What do you mean? What does he do?”

“It’s just… little stuff, you know. Like he’ll move to exclude me from conversations, or like just say I’m not brave enough to be in my house. Today, though, I dunno, I’m just being a right brat about it, ignore me,”

“Oh, shut up, honestly,” Niall says, kicking Harry’s thigh to get him to quiet down, “You always pretend that this stuff doesn’t bother you when it obviously does. If you talked to me about it more rather than bolting off after Care of Magical Creatures and holing yourself up until bedtime then you wouldn’t get so upset,”

“I know, I just don’t like confronting the idea that he’s right, because I honestly believe he is,”

Niall throws a roast potato piece at him, “Explain,”

“Okay, so, back to September first in year one. We’re all gathered in the great hall after the long, exciting trip up here from London. You’ve already gone and gotten yourself a spot in Hufflepuff and my name’s called and I _freak out_. This is the moment I’ve been dreaming about for months, even years. My family’s all been in Gryffindor, my sister completely loves it, and I can’t let them down. As I go through the crowd and take my seat up at the stool, all I can think about is something my cousin Matty told me a while ago, that the hat takes your wants into consideration,”

Harry clears his throat and takes a swig of his pumpkin juice to wash down the dryness.

“Anyway, the moment the hat’s placed on my head I start screaming in my mind ‘GRYFFINDOR GRYFFINDOR GRYFFINDOR!’ until finally it says it aloud, and all my dreams have come true. I thought, I guess, that once I was in Gryffindor it would make me, I don’t know, braver and more daring, but it just didn’t happen. Christ, I was the one who screamed the loudest during our boggart lesson last year. Usually I’m okay with it, because I’ve got so many friends spread out over all the houses that I stop worrying about which one I’m in,”

“And what makes today different?” Niall asks earnestly.

“I was just thinking-”

“Dumb start,”

“Thanks. I was thinking about how, you know, Liam’s brave and he always stands up for everyone, and Louis and Zayn are clever and cunning and have ambition out the arse, and then there’s you! And Christ, Niall, I don’t know if you’ve noticed but you’re basically Hufflepuff personified. You’re patient, fair, kind, determined-”

“I get it, I’m amazing,”

“Okay, but, I don’t fit in with any of those. I don’t fit in any house, but especially not Gryffindor. And if I can’t fit anywhere, where do I go?”

“Harry,” Niall whines, scooting his cushion across the nook so he can sit right beside Harry, “Haven’t you figured out yet that what house you’re in doesn’t matter at all?”

“It doesn’t?”

“No! All it does is decide who you get to share a bedroom and bathroom with, and that’s about it. We all take the same classes, eat in the same hall, walk in the same corridors. It doesn’t matter! The only people who really, truly care about house loyalties are people like Stan Markel, and no one even likes Stan Markel,”

Niall loops his arm around Harry’s, pulling until their sides are flush together.

“There are dishonest people in Hufflepuff, foolish people in Ravenclaw, lazy people in Slytherin, and timid people in Gryffindor, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with any of them,”

“It’s just hard when everyone’s so caught up in the quidditch cup and the house points and-”

“How do people win points for their house, Harry?”

“I dunno, do good things in front of professors?”

“You get points by being smart in class and nice to others and thinking quickly and standing up for everyone. So wouldn’t the best student, the one who every house is dying to have, be all of that? Personify all the houses? Not truly ‘ _belong_ ’ in any one of them?”

Harry mulls it over for a minute, before finally conceding, “That sounds not too far-fetched,”

“Come on, I have an idea,” Niall says quickly, detaching himself from Harry’s grasp and standing in the small space.

“What? What’re we doing?” Harry asks.

 “Can’t tell, it’s a secret,” Niall offers Harry his hand so he can get up from the floor, “But we have to take the garbage with us. Like hell I’m gonna give the house elves more work to do,”

Niall leads Harry out of their nook and through the halls. It’s nearing time where they’re supposed to be back in their own common rooms, so there’s hardly anyone in sight by faculty members with leering gazes. They work their way down the grand staircase and Harry grabs Niall’s arm once they reach the entrance hall.

“ _Now_ can you tell me where we’re going?” he asks, not thinking Niall’d actually let him know.

“Of course,” Niall smiles, that particular smile that simultaneously lets Harry know he’s up to no good and sends his brain through a loop, “You’re walking me home,”

Niall leads him down the steps to the right of those he takes every single day. Harry’s never been down this way, where only the kitchens and the Hufflepuff common room can be found, though he’s seen Niall go up and down those steps countless times in the four years they’ve known one another. It’s darker down here with no stained-glass windows to light the way like normal, only reinforcing the fact that they’re _underground_. Harry is used to the light, airy feel of his tower. Warm in its abundance of crimson and gold but with enough windows to look out over the grounds below and truly feel above all the action.

“It’s a bit damp down here, don’t you think,” Harry says as he follows closely behind Niall. He’s not even sure if he’s allowed down here considering he doesn’t think he’s ever seen someone from another house in his own common room.

“Not really, feels quite like home once you get used to it. It’s got loads of plants thanks to some past head of house. Pretty cozy, really,”

Finally Niall stops at a corner and reaches his arm out to stop Harry as well.

“I’m allowed to bring you in but I don’t think they’d like revealing how you exactly _get_ in so if you don’t mind handing me your tie,” Niall says with his hand open, waiting for Harry to listen.

“What kinda kinky stuff do you learn down there,” Harry says, continuing to take his tie off all the same.

“Shut up,” Niall laughs before tying the tie around Harry’s eyes until he can’t see.

“Don’t even try to think of getting in without me, you hear?” he starts as he guides Harry another few steps with hands at his back, “We’ve got some pretty strong security down here and it doesn’t take kindly to strangers,”

“What, do the house elves guard it for you?”

That earns Harry a punch in the shoulder.

“Wait a minute,” Harry stops suddenly, “I thought no one’s ever been down here before? Like non-Hufflepuffians? Am I the first Gryffindor to see it _ever_?”

“Oh hush,” Harry can hear a few series of taps followed by the sound of a large door opening, “Of course other people come in here. We just tell them not to tell others. Most of them listen, and the ones that don’t aren’t believed anyway,”

Niall starts to push Harry forward again, the temperature in the space rising dramatically as he imagines he enters their common area.

“By the way, you tell anyone and you see how fast house elves stop sending the good portions of bacon to the platter you just happen to be sitting in front of,”

Harry chokes, “That was _you_?”

“You underestimate just how popular I am with them,” Niall says from suddenly behind him, and then the knot around his tie is loosened and the most delightfully cheery room he’s ever seen comes into view.

“Holy fudge!” Harry says quietly, trying not to disturb the small numbers of students still left there.

There are copper lanterns around the room that send off a drowsy light and the feature fireplace stands impressive in the center of the room. Everywhere you look there are cushions (no wonder Niall had found some to decorate their nook so easily) and throws strewn about so that no student may be left with a chill. Not to mention the piles of food left out after everyone’d gone back to their rooms. Harry’d kill to get that alone.

“So do you get why I brought you here, then?” Niall interrupts his thoughts.

“You’re planning on giving me the rest of that strudel over there?”

“No,” he elbows Harry in the rib, softly and with love, “Stan Markel thinks he’s insulting you when he insinuates you don’t belong in Gryffindor because he looks down on the other houses, probably _especially_ Hufflepuff. But what’s not to love? Is there anything you common area has that we don’t?”

Harry takes a second to look around. He finds bookshelves like those back in the tower, and large tables perfect for study dates or card games. The windows may be high but he’s sure that light still shines in abundance, and there’s probably less wind that rattles the walls during the nightly storms in February. Also, considering its tower-less status, Niall probably doesn’t even have to climb five fucking staircases to get to his room each night. Lucky bastard.

“I quite like it, actually,” Harry shrugs.

“There’s nothing wrong with being in Hufflepuff, and I _know_ you know that because if you didn’t we wouldn’t be best friends, but just realize that it really means nothing. You have nothing special by being in Gryffindor besides the honor of sharing a room with Liam who I’ve heard is a very tidy, respectful boy. At least that’s what Liam says,”

“Stan Markel’d probably eat his shorts if he came in here,”

“I told you! Don’t tell any-”

“I’m not, I’m not!” Harry thrusts his hands over Niall’s mouth to quiet him down. People are starting to look at him now and he still truly feels like he shouldn’t be in here, no matter how nice it is. He only lets go when Niall licks his hand.

“Good. You are free to come back in, though. Not like… on your own. People bring their friends in all the time and it’s nice to meet more students than like… the hundred people you see every day. I can bring you in as long whenever you want. On Wednesdays Professor Weiss leads a knitting circle, it’s something everyone should try at least once,”

“Thanks for bringing me in here. It helped me feel better,” Harry admits, sending Niall a small smile, “But I’ve been a mopey shit all day and I’ve avoided all my work. I need to get back to the tower to finish it before I get poor marks tomorrow,”

“I’ll show you out, just give me the tie,” Niall holds out his open hand. Harry laughs, thinking that Niall’s joking, but he never joins in.

“Come on, you’re not serious!” Harry cries but turns around all the same.

“It’s for your own good,” Niall mumbles as he ties it around Harry’s head, trying to steer clear of the curls in the back.

“I’ve never known how into BDSM you are. I feel as if we’ve got some experimenting to do…”

Niall finally pushes him back through the door, his deep laughs echoing off the stone walls along the way.


	5. Harry Styles and the Healer

The first thing Harry registers upon waking up is something hard hitting his back. The next is the left side of his face is entirely submerged in a bowl of porridge.

“Shit,” he mutters as he grasps around the table looking for a napkin. He never finds one; instead, one magically finds his face. When he turns his head to see how, he finds Niall sitting next to him, wiping his cheek off gently.

“You can’t keep falling asleep at the breakfast table,” Niall says, mostly amused but a little concerned.

“It’s these OWLs,” Harry admits after his face is clear from all food, “They’re killing me! Not to mention they haven’t lightened the load for any of our other assignments. I’ve gotten maybe ten hours of sleep the past three nights together,”

Niall stands quickly and pulls at Harry’s arm, “Come on, you’re going back to bed,”

“Nooooo,” Harry grabs onto the bench below him to cement himself to his spot, “I can’t sleep yet. I’ve got so much to do,”

“Like what!”

“The potions skill test I keep on messing up, practice exams for transfiguration, the fucking star chart, an essay in muggle studies-”

“And you need to do that all right now?”

“I need to have them all done by Monday, yes,”

“Christ, well,” Niall sits back down next to him, “You can’t concentrate well without sleep! If you want your assignments to be good at all you need to at least sleep _sometimes_ ,”

“I know, I know, Niall. What do you think I was just doing?”

That earns Harry a swift punch in the shoulder.

“Well, you can’t sleep here, and you certainly can’t _study_ here because you’ll get nothing done,” Niall slings his bag over his shoulder and gathers Harry’s books in his arms, “Come on, we’re going to the library,”

Harry races to catch up with Niall as the two of them walk quickly through the great hall and out to the entranceway. The sun shines through the large stained-glass windows there; serving only as a reminder that not only is it a beautiful day outside that Harry will have to spend inside studying the invigoration draught, but that it was also that much closer to their exam day in the first week of June. With every flower that blooms in the garden outside, Harry knows he is one step closer to some of the most important exams of his life.

“You don’t have to come with me,” Harry starts as they climb the stairs to the library. He tries (unsuccessfully) to grab his books out of Niall’s hands. Niall’s too quick and smart for him.

“Of course I do. Mostly because I have to make sure you don’t fall asleep again, but also because I need to study, too, and it’s more fun with you,”

“Oh,” Harry says before letting it go. Really, that sounds better than holing himself up in the common room where his attention would have to go against third-years gossiping and first-years playing wizard’s chess as if it were a real contact sport.

They find a solitary table tucked away in the back of the library without too much issue, and only one or two sneers from Professor Alicate, the librarian.

“You didn’t have to carry my books for me, you know? I’m a big boy, can handle myself,” Harry explains as he spreads out all of his supplies over his half of the table.

“Barely. You look like you could pass out at any moment!”

“Hey, I ate a good breakfast this morning! Just give it ten minutes to kick it,”

“I’m gonna kick _you_ any time your head droops below shoulder level, just as a fair warning,”

Harry rolls his eyes, “Deal, I guess. What’re you studying, anyways?”

“I already finished that star chart ages ago-”

“-Course you fuckin’ did,”

“But I’m with you on that practice exams. They’re being a right pain in the arse,”

“I’d do them with you but I’ve got Arjun and Liam to help me later tonight. Apparently this girl – Noor – in sixth year is a beast at transfigurations, and she gives out tutoring for a few galleons a person on Saturday nights in the common room,”

“Okay, well, what about your muggle studies essay?”

“What about it?”

“Well, you’ve got me here for the next few hours, and not only have I been around muggles for most of my life, I thought myself to _be_ one for eleven years!”

Harry’s jaw drops, “You mean you’d help me?”

“Harry,” Niall throws a ball of paper at his mouth, “Why wouldn’t I?”

“Dunno,” he shrugs, gathering his blank parchment in front of him, “You’ve got stuff to do,”

“I can manage talking to you about menial muggle things while simultaneously faking that I know anything about how to turn a dinner plate into a mushroom,”

“Oh, really? That’d be great, honestly, I’ve never even thought to ask you for help on these,”

“Don’t know why. I think it’d be kinda fascinating to see how the wizarding world views my kind, you know,”

“We’re talking about the past history between muggles and wizards. Did you know that every single world leader in the past six centuries has been briefed on the existence of magical kind?”

“Harry… how in the world would I know anything about that? I thought you learned about like… how to work a kettle without a wand and who popular non-magic celebrities are,”

“Well, that’s how it was in third year, but the second half of last and all of this one they’ve been kinda molding us to work with muggles in the future,”

“Oh? Have you been thinking about that a lot?”

“I dunno,” Harry shrugs, “I was thinking about being a potioneer for a while, but now I’ll be lucky to even get an Exceeds Expectations on the OWLs. So, I’ve been thinking about doing something I’m actually _good at_ , you know?”

“You’re that good at muggle studies?”

“ _Wow_ , thanks for that confidence boost, bro,”

“Shut up, you just never talk about it, is all,”

“Anyways, it kinda makes sense. I’ve been hanging around you and you’re the muggliest wizard I know,”

“ _What?_ ”

“You don’t even like butterbeer for Christ’s sake!”

“In my defense, you still haven’t had Dr. Pepper-”

“ _Anyways!_ I’ve always wanted to live in London, you know. My family lives tucked away with a lot of other magical families so you were the first muggle that I really have ever gotten to know. In London, magical and non-magical folk are more mixed together. You can hardly ever find a magic-only neighborhood in London, and those are usually full of purebloods who wouldn’t want to share a garden wall with a muggle. Not really my lifestyle, you know,”

“Yeah, but you could have basically any job in London. You don’t need to work with muggles to live there,”

“I kinda want to, though. I mean, you had a great entrance into the wizarding world. Your parents were accepting and you never blew anyone up because you didn’t understand your powers. This lady came and visited our class last week and she works with the Ministry of Magic in the Newcoming Wizards department. Basically, they help muggle-borns who have just gotten their Hogwarts acceptance letters adjust to the different life. Take them to Diagon Alley to buy supplies, fund their first visit to London so their parents don’t have to foot such a large bill, and check up with the families after their kids have gone off to make sure they’re coping. It’s a very important job that most people don’t think about,”

“Oh, yeah!” Niall finally remembers, resting his chin on his hands and staring dreamily up to the ceiling, “I remember! Some lady came and greeted us at the airport a few days before we left for Hogwarts. She showed us around Diagon Alley and even bought me an ice cream… loved that lady,”

“See! I want to buy little kids ice cream,”

“Become an ice cream man, then,”

“God,” Harry huffs, looking back down to his essay, where it’s barely started.

“If you don’t mind,” Niall pulls out a large and dusty and wrinkled book from his pile, “I’ve got some charms work to do,”

“But we finished our charms homework a few days ago, together!”

“Yeah, well,” Niall shrugs, “I’ve got Professor Miggins to give me a few extra assignments, is all,”

That certainly stops Harry in tracks.

“Since when do you go to professors for _extra assignments_?”

“I need an Outstanding to get into her NEWT-level class and I don’t feel like I’m prepared enough yet,”

“Fine, fine. Do your nerd work and I’ll sit here and read about the Great Crisis of 1901, in which Edward VII had to be physically restrained after being told about magic. Very messy; what a wanker,”

 Niall sends out a breathy laugh then curls around his practice sheets. Harry takes the hint and starts focusing on his work, too, even if it’s boring and he’d rather be doing pretty much anything else. At least Niall is here.

Finally, after figuring out every possible way he can procrastinate whether it be refilling his ink or getting out a piece of his orange mint gum, Harry starts in on his essay. It’s boring as all hell but the words start coming to him easier and easier. He’s finally getting on a good run when Niall speaks up.

“Did I ever tell you I want to be a healer?” he says without looking up from his sheet, as if he said nothing at all. Harry’s quill stills.

“No. You haven’t,”

“I mean, it’s kinda new and I’m not sure yet, but it sounds like a good fit for me, right?”

Harry thinks it through as he abandons all hope for ever focusing on his paper. Niall is really good at calming people down, at talking people through their problems and offering a voice of reason. While it’s not what a healer does, per se, it does help with calming a patient down enough to work the healing magic on them. Not to mention that, ever since Niall’s mum spent an entire summer drilling into his brain that even if he wasn’t a muggle he had to actually get a job after graduation, he started excelling in school past even Zayn.

“Is that why you’ve been studying so much this year, then?”

“Yeah,” Niall squirms in his seat as he finally looks up, “I need to get EE or above for Potions, Transfigurations, Defense Against the Dark Arts, and Herbology, which is no small task. But I think it’d be worth it, yeah?”

“You’d be great at it, honest,”

Niall smiles and looks down at his work, but not before giving one last word, “And you know, St. Mungo’s is in London, too,”

It’s reasons like these that Harry gets distracted. He’s been trying harder and harder to not admit it to himself, but he can’t ignore the way he can’t stop thinking about Niall. About Niall strong hands writing out smart theories on parchment, his blue eyes staring at Harry’s from across the main hall, the cologne that follows him, his pink-tinted skin, his kindness, his radiance, his desire to help others. It drives Harry up a wall, and he honestly can’t be expected to care about muggles who can’t handle magic well when Niall’s all but promised to move in with him after graduation.

Even though he knows nothing will come from it he returns to his essay, thinking through how to best characterize how wizard officials could’ve better handled those kooks in the muggle world, when the words start to blend together and he finds his eyes closing of his own accord.

When they open again, the sun has already gone down considerably and Niall is nowhere to be found. Harry wipes away the sleep from his eyes and is about to get worried before Niall reemerges through an archway close by.

“Ah, Mr. Sleepyhead’s awake, is he?” he singsongs, a bundle of something hidden under his robes.

“I thought you were going to wake up if I fell asleep?”

Niall sits down and surveys the area, looking out for Alicate, “Well, you looked tired as shit so I thought I’d let you have a little catnap. But then fifteen minutes turned into an hour which turned into an hour and a half which turned into two, and then I left to go get these,”

He lifts up his robe to reveal a pile of muffins and two steaming thermoses of coffee.

“Christ, you’re a miracle-worker,” Harry whispers as he hungrily grabs a muffin that looks to be some kind of almond-chocolate blend. They’re not allowed to have food or drinks in the library so they have to be quiet.

“Well, you needed taking care of, so I thought I’d start my training early,”

Harry smiles and grabs one of the coffees to take a drink, ignoring the warmth that spreads through him before the drink even touches his lips.


	6. Harry Styles and the Foggy Feelings

The fog’s so thick over the quidditch field that Harry’s surprised Niall’s practice hasn’t been cancelled yet. From where he’s sitting in the rickety, wooden bleachers he can barely see anything. He’s only able to catch little glimpses of Niall, looking strong and sturdy with his bat in hand, but from what he can see he and Georgia are a force to be reckoned with. She’s young, only a third year, but probably one of the best beaters Hufflepuff’s seen in the past years. He’d never tell Niall that, though he’d probably agree anyway.

Hufflepuff’s on course to be the team to beat this year and Harry couldn’t be happier. It’s been a tough four years that Niall’s been on the team, but now they seem to have the right people in the right positions all together, and Niall knows that he’ll be silently rooting them on during their opening match against Gryffindor in a few weeks.

Niall races around the pitch in front of Harry. He’s got good form and a nice strength, batting a bludger away from the goal he’s protecting without too much effort. Harry wishes that he’d maybe gotten into quidditch when he was younger. His dad was always bothering him to practice with the neighborhood boys but he never listened. Maybe if he had he could relate to the way Niall describes it. The adrenaline, the nerves, the team bonding. There’s nowhere Harry can get that.

Finally, Niall sends one last bludger to shake Keith Frawley off his broom when the whistle blows and practice ends. It’s still quite early in the day, not even noon, so Niall will go and shower in the team room and meet up with Harry for lunch, maybe they’ll have time to study together or head off in search of trouble (Zayn and Louis) somewhere in the castle.

Right before Niall heads back into the castle, as Harry gathers up the books he never looked at to head in as well, he darts over to the other corner of the field. Harry hardly has time to wonder why before he sees her. Before he sees Niall grasp her around her waist and settle her into a long, warm, loving kiss.

Melanie is nice. She’s got long, brown braids that fall down her back in straight lines and big, brown eyes that Niall stares into with love. Her lips are full and bright and her nails are always painted a different color every time he sees her – he wonders if it’s magic. She’s smart and quick, wouldn’t be in Ravenclaw if she wasn’t, but funnier than all hell. Especially to Niall, who laughs at her jokes as if she herself drew the first smile across his face. Niall lights up around her. Well, more than Niall usually lights up, which is already a lot.

It’s not like since their thing started that Niall’s been avoiding Harry. They still hang out a lot, but just not as much as they did before. Sometimes Harry’ll look for Niall to see if he’d like to sneak up to the Astronomy Tower or eat toffee by the forest, but he’ll be too busy with Melanie to do anything. Even the next week, when they’re scheduled to go to Hogsmeade, Niall’s going off with Melanie for a ‘quaint lunch’ and a trip through the music store. Harry’s stuck with Liam, and while he likes Liam a lot, he just doesn’t fill the space that Niall leaves when he’s gone. The laugh’s different and his footsteps are too heavy and he likes butterbeer way too much.

Harry assumes it’s normal that he’s missing his best friend. They’ve been inseparable since that Tuesday night when the two of them literally ran into one another, but he guesses that he shouldn’t have thought it’d last forever. At some point in time, whether still at Hogwarts or beyond, they’d have to move away from each other. He just didn’t expect it to come so soon, didn’t expect it to be because of the girl that Niall shared a carriage with on the train to school because Harry had to patrol as a prefect, didn’t expect it to hurt so much.

It hurts in a way he’s not familiar with. He’s lost friends before, some that he was incredibly close to, but even if he’s not lost Niall it still feels different and heavier. He misses nights snuggled into the nook while they’re reading out of the same book (Niall turning the pages slower because he knows Harry takes longer) and the feeling that if Niall had to choose one person at all to do anything in the world, it’d always be Harry. Now he’s not sure, and when Niall leans in to kiss Melanie again and rubs his hand up the inside of her arm, Harry skims his hand over his own arm. Does it without thought, just a bit of comfort.

“Hey, you’re not down there spying, are you?”

Harry turns around to find Liam standing a few rows behind him. He’s got his equipment on and is probably going to practice once Hufflepuff leaves.

“I meant on our team,” Liam continues as he moves to sit down next to Harry, “I know you’re rooting for Hufflepuff,”

That gets Liam an elbow in the gut, protected by his padding, and a swift smile from Harry. But Liam follows where Harry’s been looking and finds Niall and Melanie holding hands at the edge of the pitch. They look nice together, very complimentary and like a good fit. Which is what Harry would say, if he felt like it.

“Have you told him yet, mate?” Liam finally asks.

“Told him?” Harry’s voice picks up, “Liam, I’m sincerely regretting telling you about my feelings for Niall,”

“Why! I’m trustworthy!”

“Yeah but all you talk about is feelings and letting other people know things that they don’t need to know,”

“I think Niall needs to know his best mate is crushing on him,”

“One, Liam, don’t call it a crush. That makes it sound like we’re in primary school and I’ve been offering him half of my PB&J sandwiches at lunch in an attempt of flirting. Which would honestly work with Niall but that’s neither here nor there. And secondly he does not need to know at all, thanks,”

“Oh my God, Harry, why not?”

“Because! It would do exactly no good. Besides the fact that he’s expressed no interest back to me and it’d probably just make him feel awkward, he’s got a girlfriend. What’s he supposed to say. _Oh, you think I’m dreamy? Funny, so does my girlfriend! Remember Melanie?_ ”

“I’m just saying it’d make you feel better…”

“I feel fine, thanks,”

“Sitting on cold bleachers watching a boring practice because you’re in love with a guy on the team isn’t fine. It’s pining and how you catch colds,”

“That’s not how immune systems work,” Harry mumbles.

“I don’t care. Don’t you think you’d feel better?”

“No! I’m telling you, it would do absolutely jack shit except ruin our friendship. Niall’s not in love with me and he’s not going to fall in love with me so me telling him wouldn’t change a thing. And I can’t afford to make him feel awkward around me, Liam, I can’t afford to lose him because he’s helped me through so much and been there for everything. To lose him would mean losing memories and support and understanding. It would devastate me,”

Liam stares back down at Niall and Melanie again and then back at Harry.

“You don’t hate her, though, do you?”

“Of course not,” Harry scoffs, “What’s to hate? She’s great and she makes Niall happy. I can’t hate anything that makes Niall happy, just on principle. Not even because I like him, but just how can you hate something that makes him radiate light and grin from ear to ear? It’s impossible,”

Finally Niall notices the two of them in the stands and turns his attention from poking Melanie’s cheek to giving them a goofy, two-armed wave. Melanie turns around too and waves with him. She’s smiling and laughing at something Niall mutters; Harry wishes he could hear it too.

“You know, you’re the only one Niall’s ever taken to his common room,” Liam mentions quickly.

“What?”

“That’s what Dylan told me the other day. I asked him if Niall had shown Melanie around but nope. He said the only person he’s ever known Niall to have let in through all the years is you,”

It seems silly, but it warms Harry to think of that. That’s something special they share. No one, not even Melanie, can beat him there. It’s a little possessive but he hopes it stays that way.

Niall breaks away from Melanie with a final kiss (or three) and heads back towards the changing rooms. Melanie, in her cute purple scarf and neon green nail polish, starts to make her way up to where Harry and Liam are sitting.

“Try not to bring it up with her,” Liam whispers.

But Harry wouldn’t dare, not when it’s something just for Niall and him.


	7. Harry Styles and the Worst First Kiss

“You’re sure this is a good idea?” Harry asks as he stares down at the murky water beneath his feet.

“I’m never sure anything we do’s a good idea, never stopped me, though,” Niall says from next to him.

They’re stood at the edge of the Black Lake; toes standing over the edge of a small dock by the boat house. With the weeks they’ve got left at Hogwarts slowly ticking down they’ve got a list of all the things they’ve been putting off for their final year. They’ve already stuck their heads through the trick step in the staircase (lots of dust but nothing too exciting down there) and found a way to sneak into the Ravenclaw dormitories (those purple fuckers aren’t the only ones who can solve a good riddle). Now, though, is the one Harry’s most been dreading.

“There has to be a reason no one ever swims here,” he pouts, “I mean, what about the giant squid-”

“Ugh, shut up,” Niall hits him across his bare chest, “If you’re not going to do this go get your robes on and wait for me over there, but my nipples are getting cold so I’d like to get this over with soon,”

“Fine, okay, we can do this. At the count of three. One, two-”

He’s sent tumbling into the water with a shove, breathing in a mouthful of water before the third count, Niall following him only a moment afterwards. He opens his eyes once he’s under the water. It’s murky, but he can still make out the shapes of bubbles and rocks on the floor, Niall next to him in the swimmies he brought in from home.

Finally he resurfaces for air and is able to taste the salty, dirty water he’s been staring at dreamily for the past seven years. The whole idea was better in theory.

“We did it!” Niall yells triumphantly, sending a wave of water towards Harry’s head. God, he hates him sometimes.

“You arse!” Harry shouts back, swimming closer so he can dunk Niall’s head under the lake’s surface. It only seems fair, really.

Niall splashes around for a few seconds before Harry lets him come up for air, his hair all shaggy and his cheeks flushed from the chill and excitement.

“I deserved that,” Niall says through coughs. They really could’ve picked a better day for this; it’s barely pushing 14 out and the breeze isn’t helping any.

“Yeah, well, now we’re even,”

“Truce,” Niall agrees.

“So, like, what do we do now?”

Harry spreads out his legs as they tread the water, hoping to find a bit of ground to stand on. What he finds instead is something tangled around his ankle, trying to drag him deeper into the lake’s depth.

“Shit!” he yells, kicking out his legs wildly and hitting Niall in the process.

“What’s your issue?” Niall says back, a little nonplussed about the whole ‘Harry drowning’ ordeal.

“Something’s got my leg!” he yells back as he tries to swim to the shore. It’s not that far away, he’s just not that good a swimmer, is all. Luckily Niall follows behind him and grabs him around the waist, pulling him quickly to the pebbly edge of the lake. It’s as they finally manage to get out of the water that Harry manages a look down to his leg and finds, well, certainly not a giant squid tentacle.

“It’s gillyweed,” Niall grits out as he rips it off of Harry’s ankle and throwing it at his face, “It’s a fucking plant, you git,”

“Well,” Harry starts, a little out of breath both from the swimming and the adrenaline, “At least I know you’ll always save me?”

“Yeah,” Niall laughs a little.

It’s cold out now that they’re out of the water. Well, colder than before. Harry’s about to say something really dumb, like about how he understands Niall’s nipples’ pain, when he feels Niall’s hand grip his shoulder, and Niall’s mouth on his own.

The kiss is over quick. Harry barely has time to feel Niall pull away before he can see him running back up the hill, grabbing his robes and shoes along the way. Harry’s left sitting on the edge of the lake, gravel starting to feel hard beneath his legs, toes still stuck in the small waves.

**

He finds Niall where they always find each other – the nook.

“This wasn’t a very good hiding spot, was it?” Niall says as soon as Harry ducks through the curtain. He’s standing against the wall, not looking too worried but not looking Harry in the eye either.

“We’ve been using it to hide ever since we ran away from Gilver in year two. I don’t think we have anywhere else to go,”

“That was nothing,” Niall continues quickly, “We don’t have to talk about it, if you don’t want. It won’t happen again,”

Harry leans against the opposite wall, the lake water still slowly dripping down onto the floors and an afghan he must’ve left there a few nights ago, “I think talking would be a good thing, actually,”

“It’s embarrassing-”

“-No it’s not. You know you don’t need to be embarrassed around me. I’ll always listen,”

“Fine! It’s just I’ve been thinking about doing it a lot, you know? Like we’ll be sitting at dinner and you’ll have a bit of chocolate on your lip and I want to get it off myself. Or we’ll be sitting in class together and the only thing on my mind is how easy it’d be to just lean across the table and kiss you. I can’t… stop thinking about it,”

Harry gulps and tries to hide any evidence of worry in his voice, “And how long have you been feeling that way?”

“Since last year,” Niall admits, “It was simple, really. End of the year and learning how to make amortentia in potions. I made mine and when I sat down and thought about what I had smelled there was my mom’s perfume and a good beer and the must of the stones you smell right before your enter our common room. There was something else there, too. And I couldn’t figure out what it was until you offered me a piece of your gum a few days later, and I recognized the citrusy mint immediately. Both from my potion and from the scent that’s lingered behind you ever since you found it in Hogsmeade back in third year,”

“You could’ve said something,”

“Like what! I didn’t even know what I was feeling! Should I have said _you make my stomach flip_ or _your laugh brightens up my day more than anyone I’ve ever met_. I mean! Who even says that!”

Niall sounds out of breath after he’s finished, and it takes a few more seconds of silence before Harry can think of anything to say.

“That was the worst kiss ever, mate,” he laughs, hoping that Niall will too. He’s in luck.

“Aw, I’ve just spilt my guts to you and you go and destroy my confidence in my kissing abilities, too?”

“We should try again,” Harry says quickly and little too loudly considering they’re hardly a few feet away from one another, “The last time… it tasted like the lake water and I wasn’t ready so I was probably stiff as a board and my _eyes were open_ , Niall, that was horrific,”

“We should try again,” Niall repeats as he takes a step closer.

“Yeah, just to, you know, make it better,”

“You have to not look this time,”

Harry listens and closes his eyes, Niall lips against his a surprise again, although much softer and anticipated a bit more. Harry finally has time to react, to follow Niall’s lead and actually _kiss back_. It’s exactly what he expected, and so much more, after months of staring at Niall’s mouth and wondering what it’d feel like against his own.

“Was that better?” Niall asks when he pulls back. His cheeks are redder, redder than normal, and he looks a bit shy – something Niall’s _never_ been.

“Again,” Harry says quickly, his head hitting the wall when Niall moves in closer, resting a hand on his hip and rubbing his fingers against the smooth skin at his back.

“Again,” he repeats when Niall moves back again, a hand coming to hold his chin steady in apology for moving away.

And then Niall stops pulling back.


End file.
